Alimentary products are usually prepared from flour, such as semolina, durum or other hard wheat, and water, which are metered in proper proportions and mixed until the wheat absorbs the water, forming a viscous pasta dough. Other ingredients, such as whole eggs or egg whites, are often added to enhance cooking quality. The dough is then extruded or otherwise formed to produce a shaped pasta product, such as spaghetti, or cut into smaller short cut products such as elbow macaroni or alphabet pasta. These cut products are termed "short cut pasta products", to distinguish from long cut products such as spaghetti. The resulting short cut product usually has a predetermined size, shape and weight.
After extrusion, the fresh pasta product, commonly referred to in the industry as "green" pasta, may be dried and placed in a can along with sauce and other ingredients and then cooked. However, dried pasta is not as flavorful as fresh pasta, and the pasta is more preferably prepared without ever passing through a drying operation. Generally, methods do exist for canning long pasta, such as spaghetti, in a "green" or undried state. However, it has never been practical to directly package short cut products such as elbow macaroni or alphabet pasta. The main problem is that these short cut products are soft, and quite plastic and sticky due to their high moisture content. When attempting to handle fresh short cut products by conveying or passing through volumetric or gravimetric scaling devices, or storing for any length of time, the product tends to loose its shape, stick together or stick to various parts of the equipment.
Thus, the current state of the art for preparing short cut pasta products calls for drying the product to commercial moisture levels of about 10%-12%, prior to separation, weighing and packaging. However, this drying process requires substantial energy, while further reducing freshness and increasing the chance for product contamination, as the drying process generally takes between 3 and 8 hours. Such a drying process requires very large and expensive drying equipment, adding substantially to the cost required to prepare a short cut product.